I'm here in the legendary study of the famous

fictional dogtective Sherlock Bones

of 221 B Barker Street.

Mr. Bones, you're here to teach me about

using details from a text to make inferences, aren't you?

- [Sherlock Bones] Yes, my boy!

It's simplicity itself.

But first, let me deduce a few things about you, shall I?

- [David] Well, Mr. Bones, we're trying to do this

about writing, not about people, so...

- [Bones] Give me your hand.

- [David] Waugh!

- [Bones] Ah, you like to cook,

you have a nervous disposition

and you work for Khan Academy.

- [David] Now how did you know that?

- [Bones] You have a callus on your finger

from how you hold a knife,

your fingernails are bitten, not clipped

and your messenger bag says Khan Academy.

- [David] Well and I told you who I was

before I showed up.

- [Bones] That too.

- [David] But what does this have to do with

reading a book?

- [Bones] I correctly deduced several truths

about your person based on clues, my good David.

Indeed, all inference is making sense of clues.

When you read a story, you are constantly making inferences.

- [David] I see.

Okay, I'll read a passage and then see

what I can make of it.

An hour later, thick smoke poured up the stairs.

The smoke detector screamed

and I could hear Uncle Paleo stumbling around

with the fire extinguisher.

When he came upstairs afterward, his footsteps

sounded slow and heavy.

He was a wreck, broken glasses, black smudges on his face

and singed hair.

Okay, so I can surmise that there was some kind of

fire or explosion downstairs,

where the character Uncle Paleo was.

- [Bones] Hm, how do you know?

- [David] Well his hair was singed,

that's another word for burned and his face

was covered in black smudges like you get

from soot from a fire and there was all the smoke

and the smoke detector went off.

- [Bones] And there is also the matter

of the fire extinguisher.

- [David] Also that.

- [Bones] I see something else in that passage too.

- [David] What's that, Mr. Bones?

- [Bones] Uncle Paleo was exhausted

by putting out the fire.

- [David] How can you tell?

Where does it say that?

- [Bones] Well, it doesn't.

That's inference, my lad.

Note here how it said his footsteps sounded slow and heavy.

Why might that be?

- [David] He stepped in something sticky.

No, oo, he's wearing shoes made of lead.

- [Bones] Well, those are indeed possible explanations

but you want to think of the most likely option.

- [David] He was running around to put the fire out

and it made him tired.

- [Bones] So, you were reading

between the lines, were you?

Drawing conclusions from the text?

- [David] I was.

So we know for sure Uncle Paleo was tired, right?

- [Bones] WE DO NOT, SIR.

- [David] Oh!!

- [Bones] An inference is only one possible conclusion

but is not the only conclusion.

- [David] So what are we to do?

- [Bones] The more clues you discover,

the stronger your inferences will become.

You have to look at what you already know

about a character, about the setting of the story,

the events of a story's plot and piece it

together from there.

You know that fires create lots of black dust or soot

so it strengthens your argument in favor of a fire.

And it's background knowledge like that,

about the way the world works that will serve you

as a reader and as a maker of inferences.

Apply what you know to the world of the story

and make inferences based on that.

- [David] And then, I can become the world's

greatest consulting detective?

- [Bones] You can become like the world's 50th

greatest consulting detective,

top of the heap's rather full, I'm afraid.

- [David] Well, thank you for your time today, Mr. Bones.

Best of luck with your case work.

- [Bones] Thank you; I shan't need it.

(barks)

- [David] You can learn anything. David out.